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Wednesday, February 25, 2015

February Book Club Recap - We ♥ Eleanor & Park!

The Teen Book Club met last night to discuss the February book club pick...

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell (audiobook)

Set over the course of one school year in 1986, this is the story of two star-crossed misfits--smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try.

Discussion Questions

What did you think of the book? First impressions?

Did you like the narrators? What do you think they did well, not well? Do you think it was good to have the two narrators? How would the book have been different with just one?

Did you enjoy the writing in this book? Would you be interested in reading other books by this author? Why or why not?

How do Eleanor and Park's parents shape their outlooks on the future, relationships, and life in general? How do they differ?

Is Eleanor's mother a "good" mother? Why does she stay with Richie?

Do you think Eleanor and Park's relationship would be different if the story was set in 2015 instead of 1986? How would it be different? How would it be the same?

Steve says he is Park's friend - is this true, is he a true friend? Are Steve and Tina "bad guys" in this story? Do you think Tina and Eleanor could ever be friends?

Why are music and comics important in Park's life? How are they important in Eleanor's?

Was Eleanor right to run away? Should she have left her brothers and sister behind? Was there anything else should could have done to help them?

Why do you think Eleanor does not open any of the letters from Park? At the end of the book, what do you think those "three words" Park read are?

Casting call! Do you have anyone in mind to cast as Eleanor or Park?

Ratings and final thoughts?

Ratings:

Catherine - 10 - Just read it, its amazing, an awesome audiobook.

Hannah - 10 - I love the book so much that I can't even say how much I like it.

Librarian Karyn - 10 - A sweet love story with authentic teen voices, and the narrators for the audio book made it even better!

Melanie - Didn't finish yet, withholds her rating until she does

If you liked this book you might also enjoy...

Another book by the same author

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell - In Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl, Cath is a Simon Snow fan. Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan, but for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she's really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it's what got them through their mother leaving.Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.Cath's sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can't let go. She doesn't want to.Now that they're going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn't want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She's got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words . . . And she can't stop worrying about her...

Another award-winning audio book

Glory O'Brien's History of the Future by A. S. King - Graduating from high school is a time of limitless possibilities--but not for Glory, who has no plan for what's next. Her mother committed suicide when Glory was only four years old, and she's never stopped wondering if she will eventually go the same way...until a transformative night when she begins to experience an astonishing new power to see a person's infinite past and future. From ancient ancestors to many generations forward, Glory is bombarded with visions--and what she sees ahead of her is terrifying: A tyrannical new leader raises an army. Women's rights disappear. A violent second civil war breaks out. And young girls vanish daily, sold off or interned in camps. Glory makes it her mission to record everything she sees, hoping her notes will somehow make a difference. She may not see a future for herself, but she'll do anything to make sure this one doesn't come to pass.

Another book set in the 1980s

Dancer Daughter Traitor Spy by Elizabeth Kiem - Marya is a ballet dancer born of privilege; her mother, Sveta, is the most popular ballet dancer in the Soviet Union: the regime's glamorous face to the west. When her mother disappears, Marya and her father suspect their lives are in danger and arrange a harrowing defection. But Marya has a secret - like her mother, she can see glimpses of the future: a gift coveted by the powers-that-be in the Soviet Union. Worse, she is sure her father is doomed to be murdered at their new home in Brighton beach.

Book Club Book - March

Eyes Wide Open by Paul Fleischman

Paul Fleischman offers teens an environmental wake-up call and a tool kit for decoding the barrage of conflicting information confronting them. We're living in an Ah-Ha moment. Take 250 years of human ingenuity. Add abundant fossil fuels. The result: a population and lifestyle never before seen. The downsides weren't visible for centuries, but now they are. Suddenly everything needs rethinking - suburbs, cars, fast food, cheap prices. It's a changed world. This book explains it. Not with isolated facts, but the principles driving attitudes and events, from vested interests to denial to big-country syndrome. Because money is as important as molecules in the environment, science is joined with politics, history, and psychology to provide the briefing needed to comprehend the 21st century.